


Trust Fall

by aliencereal



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-24
Updated: 2014-10-24
Packaged: 2018-02-22 11:30:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2506208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aliencereal/pseuds/aliencereal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In an AU where Duncan never recruited Alistair, Tabris meets him when she comes to the aid of the Circle.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Trust Fall

The conversation with Wynne is tense. Tabris' belief in the Maker is reaffirmed by the fact that Morrigan had agreed to stay behind at camp; she doesn't want to think about what her friend might have contributed to the discussion had she been here. Leliana's excellent archery and Ripper's snarling bite, along with Tabris' comfortable sword-work, have been enough to get them this far into the tower without major incident.

The most interesting thing about the whole interaction, though, is the templar standing at the back of the group of young mages. Tabris, hyperaware of any male human in the room as always, watches him out of the corner of her eye. The instant the right of annulment is mentioned, he visibly startles. His hand jumps to his sword hilt fleetingly before he drops it and awkwardly adopts the stiff stance of the templars Tabris had met at the base of the tower.

Wynne suggests cleaning out the demons from the whole tower. Tabris eyes the children, the templar, the young apprentices.

“Will the children be safe here?” She asks, gaze firmly set on the man in the gleaming armor. He catches her eye and actually _flinches_.

“Petra, Rinnon and Alistair will watch them,” Wynne replies, but Tabris doesn't drop her stare. The templar fidgets uncomfortably.

“Don't look at me like that, I wouldn't hurt a _child_ ,” He complains, sounding a bit like a petulant child himself. Tabris gives him another look over, her eyes lingering on the sword and the way the mages are keeping their distance.

“Come with us. Leave the children with the apprentices,” Tabris commands, her voice leaving very little room for argument. _That_ raises a bit of a stir, with the templar looking at her in complete surprise.

“You want me to come with you?” He asks, baffled.

“You're a templar. Isn't striking down abominations what you're trained for?” Tabris asks, eyebrow raised. The templar flushes at her words.

“Well-- yes, but you obviously wouldn't trust me to watch your _dog_ , let alone your back,” He points out, and Tabris snorts a laugh.

“Guess it's a good thing I have the dog to watch my back, then. Leliana, stay with the kids. If the right goes through, do what you can to reason with the templars,” Tabris turns to Leliana to give her instructions.

“I'd feel better at your side, Kalli,” Leliana frets, but Tabris pulls her into a quick one-armed hug, the other still attached to her massive greatsword.

“You're a sister, Leliana. If anyone can talk a templar down, it's you,” Tabris says with a confident smile. Leliana hesitates, then nods.

“Alright. May the Maker watch over you, my friend,” Leliana says. Tabris turns back to the nervous templar.

“Your name, templar?” She asks, free hand on her hip.

“It's Alistair. Yours is Kalli?” The templar asks, and Tabris frowns up at him. Maker take human men for being so tall.

“ _Kallian_ Tabris. _You_ may call me Tabris. I'm the acting Warden-Commander of all Fereldan, not an old friend,” She says, pointing at him accusingly. Alistair holds up his hands in surrender.

“I didn't know! Maker's breath, are you always this hostile?”

Tabris snorts and rolls her eyes.

“I'm not inclined to be polite to glorified jailers. Let's move, we don't have time for this argument.”

*

By the second hour of intense combat, Alistair is feeling much less grumpy with Tabris. Her anti-templar sentiment notwithstanding, she's an impressive fighter, and there's a clear kindness under her firm, commanding exterior. She stops every time there's a quiet moment to make sure Ripper, who is a touch too canine to answer questions about his health, is alright.

Alistair tries very hard not to be charmed, watching a pretty elven woman meticulously check her dog for even the slightest cuts.

She certainly isn't _friendly_ towards him, but she isn't as cold as she'd been at the base of the tower either. She works him into her battle strategy as easy as breathing, watches _his_ back even if she doesn't seem eager to have him watching hers. She gives him a simple, straightforward set of if-then instructions after watching him fight a few demons and hands him part of what is clearly a limited potion supply.

Alistair gets knocked out, just once, because he takes a hit aimed at Wynne. He wakes up to find Tabris standing over him in a defensive stance, her face twisted in open rage. She doesn't hold anything back. He wonders where she learned to fight as she chases the last undead archer into the corner.

“Where'd it hit you?” Tabris barks from across the room, stomping on the skull of the questionably dead skeleton.

Alistair can only give her a miserable moan in response. His head is _killing him_. Wynne's hands are clean and cool against Alistair's face and scalp as she investigates the injury.

“A cracked skull. I don't have magic strong enough to heal that without lyrium--” Wynne starts, but Tabris is already pulling a vial of familiar blue liquid from her bag.

“Fix him,” Tabris demands, all authority. It's oddly attractive, but maybe that's just Alistair's muddled brain.

Nobody asks where she got the lyrium.

*

Alistair is more trustworthy than Tabris had anticipated.

When they started getting set upon by mindless templars, she'd expected him to have a mental break of some sort. She probably wouldn't make it through being forced to strike down even her least favorite residents of her alienage.

But he obeys her orders without hesitation. She's both grateful and horrified; she doesn't know what she'd do with Alistair if he broke, but _Maker_ , these men are his friends, aren't they? How serious is templar training that they can pull this off?

She rethinks that judgement when they stop to catch their breath and she notices that he's white as a sheet and _shaking_.

“Maker's bollocks,” She mumbles under her breath and approaches him, pushing past the part of her that tells her to stay _away_ from emotionally compromised human men. She puts a hand on his shoulder, which is so _strange_ with the height difference. It's a gesture from a childhood of comforting bloody-kneed cousins.

“Alistair?” She asks, keeping her voice level but letting a little bit of gentleness in. He sighs, shakily, and squeezes his eyes shut.

“Can you handle this?” She continues, making eye contact. After a moment's hesitation, the templar nods.

“I don't... I don't like this. Maker, I _hate_ this, but there are _children_ downstairs. I'll do it for their sake,” He says, and Tabris realizes she was wrong. He'd been sincere in his concern for the apprentices. She gives him what she hopes is a reassuring smile.

“Stay strong. It'll all be over soon,” She says, patting him on the back before they head off again.

*

There's ale, and laughing, and all the mages are smiling.

“What are you going to do once you're free of the order?” One of the templars asks, grinning at Alistair over a frothy mug. Alistair laughs. He's excited, and _so_ happy.

“Find someplace sunny to sleep off the hangover,” He jokes, and the other templar slaps him playfully on the shoulder. Alistair grabs for his own mug. “And after that? Travel a bit, see if I can't get myself a dog, go fishing. Take some time to enjoy it, then find work.”

From behind him, a woman chuckles, but there's no mirth to the sound. Alistair turns to look for the source of the noise, and finds a familiar elven woman standing amongst the party. Tabris smiles sadly at him from next to a laughing mage.

“This isn't real, Alistair.”

*

Tabris doesn't make any effort to clean the blood off herself before she talks to Greagoir. It's a calculated move; it makes her look more dangerous. She stays civil throughout the conversation, even though her hands itch for want of her sword. Talking to an unfamiliar human like he might be reasonable still feels suicidal; violence is tempting even after so much of it today. She's tense and uneasy until she finally makes her move.

“The templar who helped me in the tower, Alistair. I'm taking him too,” She says, keeping her head held high to _dare_ Greagoir to protest. She hears a gasp from somewhere out of her field of vision, and then Alistair's voice.

“ _Me?_ ”

Tabris resists the urge to turn and look at him. Instead, she firmly stares Greagoir down. He looks surprised, and more than a little confused.

“He's not our best man, Warden. If you need a templar's talents for your endeavors, we can surely provide you with--”

Tabris takes a step forward, valuing the threat of the motion even though she has to crane her neck up to make eye contact now.

“No. I'm taking Alistair. You are not given a choice in this matter. If Alistair wishes to come with us, he _will_ come with us,” Her voice is harsh. She sees the flash of distaste in the human man's eyes, and for a moment, she forgets that she's a Grey Warden. She remembers Vaughan, remembers her mother's blood on her father's hands, remembers _helplessness_. She forgets that she can force the issue without violence; her hand shifts towards her blade.

“You're invoking the right of conscription? For _this_?” The older templar asks, perhaps not noticing the threat in her stance. Or maybe he's just underestimating her. Either way, it probably saves them from bloodshed, because Tabris remembers where she is. She smiles, a twisted version of politeness that edges on outright mocking.

“Yes. Yes I am.”

Apparently Alistair has moved while she was narrowly avoiding challenging the Knight-Commander, because when she breaks eye contact, she can see him. He's probably trying to get her attention; the second she looks at him he mouths 'really?' at her.

She resumes ignoring him.

*

A few hours later, they're stepping off the boat that took them back to shore.

“Take a break, guys. I think we could all use a little downtime away from the creepy eternally-staring templars before we head back to camp,” Tabris announces.

“Hey!” Alistair protests, but shuts up immediately when Tabris raises a vaguely amused eyebrow at him. He's entirely unsure if she was including him in the ranks of 'creepy templars', but it probably isn't worth pestering her about.

Maker, she really recruited him, didn't she? He won't have to spend another sweltering summer day standing in a hallway in full armor. He doesn't have to grit his teeth through hours and hours of silence. If he wants to talk to someone he sees every day there's no risk of getting told off for it.

He doesn't need to attempt to force himself to see children as dangerous animals.

But the thing is, he doesn't know _why_. It isn't a good idea to look a gift horse in the mouth, but Tabris hadn't given him the impression she was all that impressed with his skills. She hadn't given the Knight-Commander any reasons beyond having seen first hand that he wouldn't stab her in the back.

In a probably-inadvisable move, he finds his way to where she's sitting with Ripper, sharing some kind of dried meat with the dog.

“Um. Tabris, ah, I mean-- Warden-Commander--” He starts, awkward from the get-go. Tabris waves him off with a little half smile.

“Tabris is fine.”

Alistair nods, still feeling uncomfortable. He runs a hand through his hair.

“. . . Why'd you do it? Recruit me, I mean,” He asks, not quite able to meet her eyes. He has no idea what her answer's going to be. Tabris hums thoughtfully and takes a moment to scratch behind one of Ripper's ears.

“You want the real answer or more of what I told the Knight-Commander?” She asks finally, looking up at him with a mostly neutral expression.

“I'd... like the real answer, I think,” Alistair tells her, and she nods.

“I recruited you because you were miserable,” Tabris says, like it's that easy. Alistair is stunned into silence. He stares at her, dumbfounded, until she continues.

“I'm not an idiot. I saw your fade dream. You wanted out,” She smiles a little, just on this side of fond.

“I'm sure you're not the only templar who hates that bloody tower. But you _are_ the only one who fought to protect the apprentices. And you didn't hesitate for a second taking orders from an elven woman. I've met human men who would rather walk blindly into a dragon's maw than listen to me telling them not to,” Tabris says with a snort. She shakes her head and grins up at him.

“So that's why. I recruited you because you're a good man, and good men don't deserve to spend their lives miserable,” Tabris says, still smiling. Tears prickle behind his eyes and he has to swallow around the lump in his throat twice before he can speak.

“I... Thank you,” He says, his voice a cracked whisper. A softness creeps into Tabris' expression, before she banishes it with a wicked grin.

“But if anyone asks, I'm telling them it's because the party was sorely lacking in handsome men,” Tabris says, real humor in her voice, and a warmth starts in Alistair's stomach and floods out over the rest of him. He's never been struck so hard, so _suddenly_ with affection for someone before.

The silence feels warm and companionable for a few moments, and then Tabris sighs.

“Can't make you a real Warden, you know. There's this whole ritual, and I don't have a bloody clue how to do it,” She admits, and Alistair laughs, mostly to himself.

“Didn't you just say the point of this was to get me out of the tower?”

Tabris smiles at him, just a hint of sheepishness to it.

“Still. Not much glory in being a Warden Recruit forever,” She says, but she sounds a little bit relieved. Alistair shakes his head.

“I'd rather fight for a chance to be happy than glory,” Alistair tells her, and is taken off-guard by the brightness of the smile he gets in response. His heart skips a beat.

“Good priorities. I think we'll get along, Templar,” Tabris says, before she gives his shoulder a friendly squeeze and stands up to walk towards Leliana.

Alistair catches himself watching her go.


End file.
